Tirana

Tirana is the capital of Albania and a young city in full reinvention. From the secrecy of the communist era — whose traces are the bunkers of Enver Hoxha's regime — it moved, once in democracy, to turn its own centre into an urban experiment, with the façades painted in colours that Edi Rama drove from the mayor's office. Its heart is Skanderbeg Square, the largest pedestrian area in the Balkans, whose 2017 refurbishment won the First European Prize for Urban Public Space 2018. On the city's edge, the Grand Park with its artificial lake and the Dajti cable car — the longest in the Balkans, rising to 1,613 metres — frame a centre that, according to the 2023 census, gathers 598,176 inhabitants across the municipality as a whole.

In sport, Tirana concentrates the country's main facilities. The Arena Kombëtare, or Air Albania Stadium, opened on 17 November 2019 with 22,500 seats, is Albania's largest venue; it was built on the site of the former Qemal Stafa stadium, cost more than 75 million euros and hosted in 2022 the inaugural final of the UEFA Europa Conference League. The city's football is led by KF Tirana, founded in 1920 and, according to UEFA, the oldest and most decorated club in Albania. The Grand Park also provides the urban running and cycling circuits and the route of the Tirana Marathon.

Tirana was distinguished by ACES Europe as European City of Sport 2023, with the handover at the European Parliament in Brussels on 6 December 2022. The recognition had a founding value for the country: Tirana was the first Albanian city to receive an ACES title and opened a series that has since been continued by Vlorë (2024), Shkodra (2025) and Korçë (2026).